They say the average person walks past eleven murderers in their lifetime. I had the pleasure of living with one.

It all started in the most ironic place possible – a church. A church fair to be exact. I’d just gotten off my shift, my clothes stained with Coca-Cola and Sprite when I spotted a familiar blonde head in the crowd. I watched curiously as my mother, rather reluctantly, gave away her sandwich to a man standing in front of her who took the food without hesitation. At the time, I thought nothing of it, yet that moment would change the course of my entire year.

His name was Alberto. He was homeless, trying to support his daughter as well as himself, and a bit odd. He needed a place to stay. That was the overview my parents had given me when the topic of his living situation had been brought up. At first, I wasn’t very open to the idea. Who were these people? We didn’t even know them. We weren’t friends. For all we knew, they could have been murderers. My parents, devout Christians and a compassionate couple were also having trouble with the choice between doing what seemed right or staying safely in their comfort zone.

Turns out we had nothing to worry about since only one of them was a killer. Everything started out as well as could be expected, with all of us trying to get used to the new life we were living. Personal space was no longer a thing, but that had been replaced by late-night games of truco. Once Alberto got a job, his impromptu gifts to the family overshadowed his crazy rants and his daughter’s comments about her relatives in the Italian Mafia. While trying to do what was right, we ignored their disturbing comments and violent disposition.

It wasn’t until a couple of months into this living arrangement that he started to speak openly about his past as a hitman for our old corrupt government. Naturally, we were skeptical because he said many crazy things all the time. We turned a blind eye when he taught me self-defense moves from his time in the military. All we could do is look at each other doubtfully when he showed us pictures of himself with prominent politicians from his past.

But the evidence was piling up. We lived in a sort of limbo, where none of us knew what the next step was. Our faith tells us to love one another unconditionally, but how were we supposed to do that with someone who bragged about working as an assassin for the government? In Argentina that was very believable.

To this day neither my parents nor I regret helping them out. The whole thing was a massive gray area for us and a test of our faith since we were torn between wanting to help and protecting ourselves. That whole year was incredibly difficult for me because I wanted to help, but I also missed my life before they walked through the door.

Life has a way of throwing you curveballs that leave you questioning the foundations of your faith. I know that I struggled with the whole situation, but I finally realized that it didn’t make me a bad person. It made me human. Living with Alberto wasn’t easy, especially since it might have ended badly.

Now, I understand that I’m allowed to be human while still valuing my morals and putting trust in my faith. All of us are walking mosaics of every person we have ever encountered. They all hold a piece of the glass-stained window of our soul – whether they are a friend, your kindergarten teacher, or the murderer my mother gave a choripan to at my church’s annual Christmas fair.